July 29, 2010 at 6:13 p.m.
Filed under:
Conventions,
Tourism
By Kathy Bergen
Mayor Richard Daley Thursday named venture capitalist Bruce Rauner as chairman of the board of the Chicago Convention & Tourism Bureau, the publicly subsidized non-profit organization that books business into McCormick Place and markets the city as a business and leisure destination.
Rauner comes to the position after a stint this spring on an interim board of the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, the state-city agency known as McPier that owns and operates McCormick Place and Navy Pier. Get the full story »
May 25, 2010 at 11:19 a.m.
Filed under:
Chicago executives,
Conventions,
Policy,
Politics
James K. McCusker, Viante Home Products Company, demonstrates his company’s new coffee maker at The International Home and Housewares Show at McCormick Place in 2009. (Bradley Piper/Chicago Tribune)
By Kathy Bergen
| Top executives with the International Home + Housewares Show fired off an email to Gov. Pat Quinn today, saying they could not recommend Chicago as the show’s venue for 2012 and beyond when their board meets later this week unless the governor signs the McCormick Place overhaul legislation.
“The lack of signature to this bill will ultimately send us and other vitally important trade show business elsewhere,” the email stated. It was signed by Phil Brandl, president of the International Housewares Association, and Mia Rampersad, the group’s vice president/trade shows. The association’s show has been a cornerstone of the city’s convention business since 1939.
Quinn is expected to make a decision on the bill within days. Sources expect he will sign it, but will try to attach some changes as well.
May 4, 2010 at 3:37 p.m.
Filed under:
Conventions,
Policy,
Politics
By Kathy Bergen | The agency that runs McCormick Place and Navy Pier could look to
corporate America and to the traveling public for additional revenue
streams — if legislators go along with proposals being discussed this week
in Springfield.
Lawmakers are considering letting the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition
Authority, or McPier, sell naming rights to its facilities.
Twenty-five percent of the proceeds would go into an incentive fund for
luring new trade shows, and 75 percent would go toward paying off
facility expansion bonds. An estimate on potential proceeds was
unavailable Tuesday afternoon.
Get the full story »
